Patients and corpses side by side

Lying on a stretcher in the dark outside the Mamboro health clinic in Palu is a five-year-old girl with a broken leg. She was found alone, Doctor Sasono tells me. “We don’t know where her family is and she doesn’t remember where is lives.” His clinic has no power and is running out of medical supplies.

A few metres from her stretcher bed are rows of bodies in bags. The smell of decomposing bodies fills the air.

Dr Sasono says they will be buried in mass graves to stop the spread of diseases: “They are starting to smell. We want to wait for relatives to pick them up but we can’t wait any longer.”

Rows of rubble lie all along the shoreline where vibrant fishing villages once stood.

People’s possessions lie smashed together with cars and boats tossed around by the massive waves. Amid the rubble are tents where families are sleeping out in the open.

How difficult is the rescue work?

Blocked roads, a damaged airport and broken telecommunications have made it difficult to bring help into the affected area, and impossible to contact more remote regions.

Image copyrightAFPImage captionRoads have crumbled as the ground underneath gave way

“We don’t know for sure what is the impact,” said Mr Nugroho.

Local media report that mobile phone signals have been detected in the rubble of the shopping mall in Palu, and shouts have been heard under the debris of the Roa Roa Hotel.

Image copyrightEPAImage captionDozens of people were known to be inside the Roa Roa hotel

One volunteer, Thalib Bawano, told AFP news agency that three people had been rescued from the hotel rubble, where more than 50 people may be trapped.

“We also heard voices at several points, including a child,” he said.

“They were asking for help, but they are still there till now. We gave them motivation… so they can have spirit because they are trapped between life and death.”

“We gave them water and food but that’s not what they wanted. They wanted to get out. ‘We want to get out, out, out. Help! Help!’ they kept screaming. That’s what we heard. Some were just knocking.”

What are the other challenges?

In Palu, people have been sleeping in the open, wary of returning to their homes, even if they are still intact.

With hospitals damaged, injured people have been treated in the open and at least one military field hospital has been set up.

The military has taken over the airport to fly aid in, and injured people and other evacuees out.

“What you’ll see, you know, as the days go by and people don’t have access to adequate hygiene supplies, shelter, you’ll see the situation deteriorate if they don’t get that access so, we’ve sent shelter kits,” Tom Howells, programme director for Save The Children, said on Sunday.

Image copyrightReutersImage captionMilitary aircraft have been evacuating some of the injuredImage copyrightEPAImage captionA shattered mosque in Palu

With supplies limited, people have been raiding damaged shops for food, water and medicine.

“We don’t have any other choice, we must get food,” one man told AFP.

Meanwhile mass graves are being dug, one of them for up to 300 bodies.